


Damsel

by mechakucharumba



Category: Homestuck, Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Ougon no Taiyou | Golden Sun, Pokemon
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-09
Updated: 2012-01-09
Packaged: 2017-10-29 06:57:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/316984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mechakucharumba/pseuds/mechakucharumba
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or: five times that Rose saved Paprika's ass, and one time that Paprika saved hers (sort of).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Damsel

**Author's Note:**

> Horribly self-indulgent series of two canon scenes and four AU ones (Meguca AU, GS AU, Boobiestuck, and the Pokemon AU that's technically the original canon but actually it isn't) in which Rose saves Paprika from the universal constant--her own brainlessness. Also because I make it look like Rose is the more dependent member of the relationship, and more emotionally unstable, when she's usually the one doing all the asskicking. Also excuse me as I cry alone at night because the font/colours for the pesterlog won't show.

1

You are twelve, and uncertain if you like where this is going.  From inside his new tank, the iguana stares back at you, equally skeptical. 

“I’m thinking ‘Captain Handbag’,” Paprika declares at your shoulder, and you get the feeling she made that name up just now.

“You can’t call him that,” you say, rolling your eyes, “That would be like me getting a pig and naming it ‘Bacon Sandwich’.”  You’re not trying to make her laugh—you never are—but she does so all the same, like bubbles in your tea. 

“Naw, they don’t make handbags out of iguanas,” and after a beat, “I think.”  You realize this is about as futile as getting her to change the name of the sack of flour the two of you raised last year for sixth grade social studies, the only pair not comprised of a boy and a girl.  Sure enough, Alfred Hitchcock Sulu Zimmerheinzberg the Third watches you from Paprika’s desk with a sloppily drawn-on smile.  Peering over the lid of the tank, you meet Captain Handbag’s gaze squarely, realizing you would have preferred it greatly if Paprika had made a pet rock like any normal kid whose parent has fur allergies.

“Iguanas are supposed to be unpleasant,” you caution.

“Huh-uh!  I Googled it, and they say all you have to do is pick ‘em up every day and play with ‘em, and then they’ll like you.  They can learn their names, too—watch!”  Paprika scoots up close to you and takes off the lid, grinning ear to ear.  “Hey, Captain Handbag!”  The iguana makes a grand show of doing absolutely nothing.  Undeterred, Paprika sticks her arm into the tank and wiggles her fingers about, hoping to attract her new pet’s attention. 

You’re not quite sure what compels you to do it, but you find yourself yanking her hand out of reach just before it finds itself the hapless victim of an iguana bite.

“They bite,” you say flatly in response to Paprika’s awestruck stare, deigning to mention that you actually read up on the keeping of pet iguanas.  You are still at the age where you trust your friend’s parents in her care and keeping, but you’re old enough to have begun thinking that maybe you know best.

“Dang,” she murmurs, and for just a spilt second, you think her infallible cheer will be deflated.  Just a second, at least until her grin comes back in full force, and she proceeds to tap at the side of the tank with a finger.  “Holy crud, dude, we could make you, like, our guard iguana or something!”  You sigh deeply and resist the urge to put your hand to your forehead in exasperation the way your mother does when she thinks you’re not looking.

“Just be careful with him,” is all you say, retreating to the safety of the bed, where you contemplate the fact that you will probably be nursing iguana bites on her fingers for the next few weeks.

 

2

As much as you would like to believe this isn’t necessary, you have no choice but to let Paprika come along with you across roofs as you seek out Demons.  Necessary, if only because you have to keep what’s left of her in one piece, your frenzied, furious, loving explanations of what exactly she’s become falling on deaf ears and smiling lips.

“It’s cool,” she says, a hand on your shoulder, and you wonder how she handles it, how the most gullible fool to ever sell her soul to something far worse than any storybook devil could act like she’s just been given the gift of a lifetime.  Even her costume looks like a clown’s, absurd pom-poms dangling merrily from the top layer of her skirt, ribbons in her hair.  It isn’t, you want to tell her, but it sticks in your throat like a sick toffee.

“Over there,” you say instead, pointing to the pixelated wave of corruption stalking through the alleyway a block over.  The two of you make your way to the Demon’s barrier with far greater ease than humans have any right to possess, and you can only hope you’re doing the right thing in playing this forced hand.

There is only one, a behemoth variant that you recognize as a manifestation of suppressed jealousy from fight after fight in the school parking lot.  You draw your whip and size it up, concern for Paprika’s wellbeing set aside for just a moment in the name of strategy.  Go for its legs, you think, and cut it down to size.  Unused to coordinating your strategies with anyone, you begin to speak too late—Paprika is already in  front of you, stance wide and gauntlets extended like a gun.  The Demon lurches forward, wailing, and your legs surge into belated motion, something like “look out!” tearing itself from your lips.  Panic wells in your chest for the first time, always subconsciously repressed by the knowledge that, up until now, you’ve had nothing left to lose.  She’s such an idiot, your mind screams, such an idiot, as light gathers at Paprika’s fists, erupting like a volcano straight through the Demon’s torso.  It keens, wavering, before bursting into a spray of squares that rain down over their heads.

“Told you it was all cool,” and your jaw might have dropped a bit.

“Just don’t be reckless,” you scold, sighing inwardly with relief, “If you’re going to be a Puella Magi, we have to work—” you cut yourself off at the sight of another, smaller Demon, its thick claws moving to encircle Paprika’s throat.

“We’ve gotta work what?” as your whip lashes out, the blade at its tip neatly severing the Demon’s fingertips.  It recoils with a scream, energy pooling at its mouth to shoot out at you.  The arc of your whip meets the blast in the middle, a sharp spark of whiteness engulfing the Demon’s attack, neutralizing it.  Back in your element now, you bring around the whip one more time, wreathing this last lash with magic enough to slice the Demon’s head clean from its shoulders on the downwards stroke.  As it dissolves, it’s Paprika’s turn to gawp, and you know for certain as the barrier fades that she hadn’t even seen her attacker coming.

“As I was saying, we need to learn to work together,” coiling your whip back up and hooking it onto the holster at your side, “And you need to learn to be careful.”

“Holy shit,” she says, still in awe, and you purse your lips.  You want to shake her like a bad puppy, anything to impress upon her the magnitude of her choice, of your stupidity in letting her make it.

“There’s more left to do,” you tell her, moving forward, “Even in a town like this, there are plenty of Demons.”  She catches you by the forearm, and before you can scold her, she pulls you into a deep kiss, the serious kind so uncharacteristic of her that it catches you completely by surprise.  You realize how childish she’s being, but that doesn’t stop your gloved hand from coming up into her hair, your desperation for her halcyon happiness to remain intact pouring out from your lips.  When you come apart, she is jovial as ever, like nothing at all happened beyond a chaste little exchange.

“It’s all good, Rose,” she assures you, clapping your shoulder, “We’ll be like those two chicks from Sailor Moon that they said were cousins, but they were actually lesbians.  Y’know?”  Having been strictly banned from the Cartoon Network as a kid, you don’t know, but for her sake, you pretend you do.

 

Kyubey finds you in your bedroom at the end of the night, tired but unable to sleep.

“I told you she’s stronger than you’d expect for a human so particularly lacking in intellect,” he chirps, tail swishing back and forth.

“I’m going to kill you,” you say, and you half-mean it.

“There was another girl who told me something like that, once.”

“I don’t doubt that there are plenty of girls out there who would say something to that effect.”  Kyubey’s expression does not change, but you have learned that the flick of his ears is something like pondering.

“But how many of them get angry for someone else’s sake, rather than their own?”  He doesn’t elaborate, and when you think back to the red, red ribbons in Paprika’s hair, you don’t need him to. 

 

3

Thinking back to the few events in your lifetime that could be deemed memorable, you don’t ever recall being truly angry.  Chagrined, yes, and perhaps scornful—if you had never felt scorn, you never would have left Lemuria.  Anger, though, is new, fisting at your heart as your sword streaks across the throat of something more monster than man.  Blood whips across your torso, seeping into the deep blue of your jacket until it can barely be seen, but you ignore it, as it pertains little to what you’ve come here to accomplish.  Certainly, you realize, boots a sharp staccato on the stones, you are not angry for yourself.  You are angry for a certain trusting simpleton who wandered straight into the hands of those who would do her harm.

At the very least, you do not boot down the door—you somewhat doubt that you could.  You are calm enough at least to take the keys you relieved a corpse of and fit them into the lock, your fingers slick with blood and frustration simmering like water in a kettle.  Uncertainty at what awaits you is overcome by a mixture of anger and concern, prompting you into the squalid prison cell.

“Paprika?” you call, tentative.  Something behind the bars shifts, and in the dim light, you catch sight of her white scarf, significantly less pristine than usual.

“Rose?” and your fury subsides as abruptly as the sea retreating from a beach.

Still, “These bars hardly should have posed a challenge to you,” rotten, rusted metal.  You have seen her bring forth flames from the depths of the earth as easily as she smiles, the kind of raw power only truly possessed by a Mars Adept. 

“Tried that,” she says, shuffling closer to you, “They kind of beat me up,” and you can see the bruises bloomed on her cheeks, her arms, wherever skin shows.  Your hand itches to reach out and cover her wounds, melt them away with Ply’s cool touch—for all her warmth, she cannot heal for herself.  Naturally, she would not have fought back against her captors, for all that you can plainly see they are too far divorced from their humanity to be worth mercy.  “Being all locked up really takes the fight out of you, y’know?”  You tut, finding the key to her cell and unlocking the gate.  When she exits, it is with a slight limp, and you swear to yourself that you will lock her in your cabin for at least the next week, no matter how skilled a healer her brother might be.  In spite of her swollen jaw, she smiles at you, that soft, private smile that makes your heart turn to melted butter, for all that she is virtually a child in comparison to you.

“Come, then,” you tell her, hoping to sound ginger.  You let her sling an arm over your shoulder for support, and ignore her gawking at the flotsam you’d left behind in your wake to reach her.

“Where’re the others?” when you stride out the gate unchallenged.

“At the ship,” you say simply, not having dwelled too long on the fact that asking the aid of others in her rescue had not even occurred to you.

“You came by yourself?” and she cannot help the incredulousness in her voice.

“Time was of the essence,” you explain, though you know she will not understand how precious each and every second by her side is to you.

“Geez,” she mumbles, and sitting her down by the side of the path, you can’t help but note the similarities between the expression she makes and that worn by the dejected dog who was nearly as tired of Lemuria as you were.  “Uh, I guess I should say sorry.”  You crouch beside her, brushing the shaggy bangs back from her face, and at last resolve your urge to heal, running over the worst of the bruises with the utmost gentleness.

“There’s hardly anything to apologize for—you will be a fool until the end of your days, no matter what I do to dissuade you from it,” you say, though you are acutely aware of the unintended tenderness saturating your voice.  Paprika laughs at that, and you can’t stop yourself from kissing her then, all your relief for her safety and fascination with her love of life put into the twine of your arms around her neck.  She cups the back of your head and pulls you closer, her lips a smile from which you never want to be parted.

It’s longer than you had perhaps intended before you part, both of you short of breath and flustered.

“We’re too gross to do this,” she says candidly, and you realize that you are nearly as much of a mess as she is, your clothes splattered with blood and your hair escaping its pins.

“Very well,” you acquiesce, standing, “We’ll continue at such a time that you’re truly well enough to do anything.”  It’s innocuous, but she has always been the instigator, so it’s enough to cheer her, chasing away the last shadows of whatever she might have endured.  Leading her back to the town, she indicates the two of you with a fanciful gesture.

“Sure hope nobody runs into us,” she says, “We look like murderers.”  A moment of consideration, and she adds, “Or pirates.  You look like you could be a pirate, Rose.”  Having never actually met such an individual, you can hardly judge one way or another, but at this point, you hardly care.  You could certainly stand for a bath, though.

 

4

  
**\-- elegantEdifice [EE] began trolling piquantNabes [PN] at xx:xx—**   


  
EE: I wonder sometimes how exact//y you managed to survive the tria//s.   


  
PN: :P: hey i totally saw him coming!!   


  
EE: If you were anyone e//se, I might have be//ieved that.   


  
EE: Though I do have to wonder how you didn’t notice the //ooming shadow of such a //arge ogre.   


  
EE: Our opponents are growing in strength as each of us enter the Medium, it seems.   


  
PN: :P: wait thats here right?   


  
EE: I hope you were joking there.   


  
PN: :P: no seriously   


  
PN: :P: this weird place with all the red plants and film strips and humpbeasts is the medium right?   


  
EE: I’//// be kind and cha//k up your lack of understanding to Basi//e being an insufferable prick.   


  
EE: As usua//.   


  
EE: In any event, as your server p//ayer, I won’t be ab//e to watch over you as c//ose//y now, since it’s my turn to act as the c//ient.   


  
EE: Your Sprite is sti//// with you, right?   


  
PN: :P: yeah   


  
PN: :P: its good to see him again   


  
PN: :P: even though hes all glowy and shit now   


  
PN: :P: but he can talk!   


  
PN: :P: hes a pretty cool guy   


  
PN: :P: blows up imps, doesnt afraid of anything   


  
PN: :P: yknow?   


  
EE: Just   


  
EE: Just try to stay in one piece?   


  
EE: I norma////y wouldn’t trust Basi//e on these matters, but as I’ve now a//so spoken to his informant and am witnessing the destruction of our p//anet as we speak, I have p//enty of reason to be//ieve that this game is incredib//y dangerous.   


  
PN: :P: well yeah i mean were all getting our hives and stuff blown up by meteors and everythings kinda going to shit   


  
PN: :P: but its all good   


  
PN: :P: i mean, were playing this game for a reason, right?   


  
EE: Supposed//y.   


  
PN: :P: so well win or whatever   


  
PN: :P: the mediums pretty cool, so you should hurry up and get here   


  
PN: :P: oh and thanks for saving me and stuff   


  
EE: I’//// do my best to hurry.   


  
EE: It’s not a prob//em.   


  
EE: Someone has to //ook after you.   


  
EE: Your //usus was terrible at it.   


  
PN: :P: wow rude!   


  
PN: :P: but yeah when you put it that way i guess im pretty pitiful   


  
PN: :P: right?   


  
EE: Now you’re just trying for f//attery.   


  
PN: :P: right????   


  
EE: Right.   


  
EE: I have to go now.   


  
EE: Basi//e has finished dep//oying everything necessary for me to start p//aying in earnest.   


  
EE: I’//// see you soon.   


  
PN: :P: cyn   


  
EE: Yes?   


  
PN: :P: <3   


  
EE: I   


  
EE: <3   


  
**\-- elegantEdifice [EE] ceased trolling piquantNabes [PN] at xx:xx—**   


  
PN: :P: aw yeah   


  
PN: :P: i gave that matesprit a heart   


  
PN: :P: matesprits love hearts   


  
PN: :P: im the best   


  
PN: :P: its me   


 

5

You’d like to think that after so many years travelling alone, your sister would know how to handle herself.  You’d _like_ to think so, which of course means Paprika has gone off and done something stupid again.  It’ll be good for her character, your mom and dad had said when you told them their oldest daughter had run off to Orre in pursuit of some eclectic criminal, they were off fighting the forces of evil at that age.  You wonder what you (and by extension, Basil) did to deserve being born into a family of hotheaded lunatics, your uncles notwithstanding.

The desert wind strips your throat dry, but you force yourself not to stop for a drink just yet.  Granted, you have a nearly limitless supply of water on hand, but you don’t like to draw from your Pokemon unless absolutely necessary.  The last town you’d visited had been little more than a ramshackle collection of houses, but its citizens were eager to confirm that a girl riding a Camerupt had been through about a week ago, haplessly friendly.  Grimacing, you park your (quasi-legally) borrowed motorbike outside the warehouse where Paprika’s allegedly taking on her criminal.

It doesn’t take you long to find her, not when the entire building is shaking with the force of what is presumably a series of Earthquake attacks.  You follow the tremors, and any lingering peons either get out of your way or quickly regret the decision.  It rubs you the wrong way, taking it out on their Pokemon, so you go easy, but it still leaves a bitter taste in your mouth.  She’s cornered when you finally catch sight of her, shouting something at the most ridiculous-looking man you have ever seen, dressed in yellow spandex with an enormous afro coloured like a Pokeball.  Her opponent seems to be making an escape, and you move to ensure that he doesn’t when you realize Paprika is taking on six opponents at once with only half her own team.  Judging by the fact that they are all flanked by Water, Ground, and Rock types, you conclude that they were quite ready for her.

“Adieu, darling,” the bizarre man trills, stepping onto the ladder of a helicopter hovering overhead the open ceiling, “Better luck next time!” 

“Hey!” Paprika shouts, though you’re not sure whether it’s at the fact that her target is escaping or that her Ninetails’ legs have just given out under her.

“’Hey’ to you, too,” you say, and you have to admit the way your sister’s face lights up when she sees you makes your heart flip.  Reaching for a ball at your belt, you call out your Lanturn, Relicanth, and Jellicent, relishing the looks on the peons’ faces as they slowly realize they are well and truly fucked.

 

“Mom and dad were cool with it,” Paprika protests after you’ve scolded her on the foolhardiness of charging off after some bizarre remnant of the disco age who so happens to enjoy kidnapping Pokemon. 

“Mom and dad, no offense, are not exactly the sharpest tools in the shed,” you say, straddling the motorbike again, “You need an actual strategy to go after someone like this.”

“Y’know, I bet you have a strategy for how you brush your teeth,” she grumbles, but there’s no heart in it as she climbs on behind you.  When her arms wrap around your waist, you feel your stomach drop, and any beginnings of a retort promptly vanish.  Her breath is warm against your exposed ear, and you know you’ve got nothing on how to win this one.

“Rose?” and you start, hoping she’s too oblivious to see the way your cheeks flush, “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” you say quickly, too quickly, “I’m just thinking of our next move.”

“’Our’ next move?” she repeats, sounding a bit incredulous.  Back on slightly surer footing, a little smirk creeps its way onto your lips.

“Yes, our next move, as in the both of us working together.  Synergy is important, remember?”  It’s been hammered into your heads since you were old enough to hold a Pokeball, and you feel her smile against your ear. 

“Aw, sweet!  This douchebag isn’t gonna stand a chance against us together!”

“That is,” you interject, ignoring the flutter inside your ribcage, “Provided we stop to heal your Pokemon, first.”

“Oh,” sheepishly, though you know how deeply she cares, “Gotcha.  We ready to roll?”  You nod and rev up the engine of the bike that you technically are not even licensed to drive, speeding off against the sun.  Paprika’s arms are still tight around your waist, chin nuzzled against the crook of your neck, and you figure that carrying her off on your noble (albeit stolen) metal steed is about as good as you’re going to get, no matter how tight it makes your throat at the thought of something more that you can never have.

 

6

You are seventeen, and you have just graduated high school.  One girl’s shoe heel broke as she walked across the stage, but otherwise, the entirety of the ceremony was completely innocuous.  You weren’t really expecting to cry, and so you don’t.  Instead, you wait in a corner of the room, pointedly ignoring your parents as they pointedly ignore one another.

Someone taps your shoulder with a plastic cup, and you know it’s Paprika before you even turn around.  She’s ditched her cap and gown, revealing the kind of dress that makes you blush a little to look at for too long.

“Sprite okay?” she asks, handing the cup to you even before you get the chance to nod.

“Were they out of punch?” you inquire, all too happy to talk about the innocuous.

“Mm-hm,” and there is comfortable silence until, “Dang, can you believe it?  I mean, like, it seems like we just met each other yesterday.”  You have to smile at the tired aphorism, if only because it’s true.  “D’you remember that one time in seventh grade when we raised Alfred Hitchcock Sulu Zimmerheinzberg the Third?”

“That was sixth grade,” you correct her, taking a sip of your drink.  It bubbles in your mouth like your favourite tea, like her.  “Seventh grade was when you got Captain Handbag.”

“Aw, right,” deferring to your memory, given that hers is not always particularly reliable.  “Wasn’t there that one time when he almost bit me, but you were like all ninja and grabbed my hand out of the way?”  It takes you a moment to recall, but you nod.

“And you ended up getting bitten on a daily basis for the next few weeks anyways.”

“Did not!” she’s quick to protest, “It was only a couple more times.  Besides, we’re cool now.”  You’ve since warmed up to Captain Handbag, and he even permits you to hold him.

“Mm,” and she leans her head against your shoulder.  You lean back, closing your eyes.  If it weren’t for the fact that your sandals are beginning to make your feet ache, you might gladly stay like this indefinitely.

“I still think that was totally legit,” Paprika adds, “The whole ninja thing.”

“Someone has to watch out for you,” you say, and you instantly regret it—Syracuse is hardly the twenty-minute drive from your house to hers that you’ve known nearly all your life.

“Yeah, well you’re pretty good at it,” and she pulls away to look you in the eye, like she somehow felt that same pang of regret.  “I mean, it’s not like we’re never ever gonna see each other again,” she says, hands on your shoulders, “Like, I’ll call you every morning on Skype and we’ll eat cereal together or some schmoopy stuff like that.”  She’s so earnest, so simple, that you find yourself tearing up when you’d been certain you wouldn’t.  You let her wrap you up in her arms, lips pressed against your temple, and you feel like an idiot even as you’re so full of love that someone could make a Disney Channel movie out of it. 

At last, she adds, “If I fall down a well or some shit, though, that’s all on you, man,” and you laugh wetly in spite of yourself.  Drying your eyes, you take a deep breath, then exhale.

“Alright,” you tell her, lips quirking upwards, “If you fall down a well or get kidnapped by a serial kidnapper, I’ll come and rescue you.”

“You can’t get kidnapped by a serial kidnapper,” Paprika protests, leading you off in pursuit of the batch of onion rings that has just appeared on one of the buffet tables, “Try, like, a crazy disco dude who’s also a mad scientist.”  You have no idea why it has to be a disco-loving mad scientist, but you suppose it all boils down to Paprika being Paprika, and so you don’t bother questioning it for once.

At least, not until she suggests that you dress up as the knight in shining armour to her fair maiden for the all-night grad party.


End file.
